Reasons to Immunise
When our daughter Britt told us that baby Zoe had gained almost three pounds in her first month of life, we were thrilled. The weight gain was a positive sign that our new grand-daughter, who weighed just 2.2 kilograms at birth, was healthy and growing. But when Britt added that she was afraid to give Zoe the recommended childhood immunisations, my elation turned to concern.
But Britt isn’t the first parent to think this way in modern times. Many who haven’t seen or experienced the epidemics of the past century question the need and safety of childhood immunisation, wondering if the vaccines cause more harm than good.
While fear causes us to seek answers, much of the fear of immunisation is based on misinformation, whether from news stories reporting “possible” links between a childhood vaccine and illness or from groups opposed to immunisation.
Immunisation was among the great medical successes of the 20th century as diseases that once killed or harmed thousands of children were eliminated. For example, in the US, before vaccines: polio paralysed 10,000 children; rubella (German measles) caused birth defects and mental retardation in as many as 20,000 newborns; and pertussis (whooping cough) killed 8000 children (mostly infants) each year.
But we’re not totally out of the woods. The bacteria and viruses that result in preventable disease or death are still alive and can be transmitted to those who are not protected by immunisation. Even if there are only a few cases of a vaccine-preventable disease in the world, that disease could spread like wildfire across the globe, harming or even killing millions if immunisation were terminated.
how vaccines work
Using an inactivated (dead) agent or an attenuated (weakened) live organism, vaccines stimulate the immune system into reacting as if they were fighting a real infection. The immune system then “remembers” the organism so that if it enters the body in the future, the immune system can quickly mobilise to suppress it.
Under perfect conditions, vaccines work to protect us from disease. But vaccines are not 100 per cent effective for reasons related to the individual person. In fact, it’s estimated that childhood immunisations are only about 85-95 per cent effective in protecting the recipients against disease.
dispelling the myths
There are many misconceptions used to support an anti-vaccination position. Following are the views of the United States Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta, Georgia:
Myth: Diseases had already begun to disappear before vaccines were introduced, because of better hygiene and sanitation.
Fact: There is no question that improved sanitation and socioeconomic conditions impacted diseases. Still, when assessing the disease charts through the years, you can see the peaks and valleys, with the real, permanent drop occurring when the wide use of vaccines started. This is particularly seen with the measles vaccine and Hib (Haemophilus influenzae type B) vaccine. For instance, it’s known that sanitation in the US is not better now than it was in 1990, so it’s hard to attribute the virtual disappearance of Hib to anything but the vaccine.
Also, in countries such as Japan, Sweden and Great Britain, which allowed the immunisation levels of pertusis vaccine to drop because of fear of the vaccine, the disease soared to epidemic proportions. The same happened in the Soviet Union, where there’s a major epidemic of diphtheria because of low immunisation rates for children and adults.
Myth: There are “hot lots” of vaccine that have been associated with more adverse events and deaths than others.
Fact: Vaccine manufacturing facilities and vaccine products are licensed and every vaccine lot is safety-tested by the manufacturer.
Myth: Vaccines cause many harmful side effects, illnesses and even death.
Fact: You need to consider the alternative when you weigh the risk and benefits of immunisation. Consider what smallpox, polio or any of the other vaccine-preventable diseases could do to you or your child. Statistically, vaccines seem incredibly safe compared to these potentially deadly illnesses.
Adverse side effects from vaccines may include a sore arm or slight fever, but major illness from a vaccine is rare. In this case, the benefits of disease prevention far outweigh the risk of possible side effects.
Myth: Giving a child multiple vaccinations at the same time for different diseases increases the risk of harmful side effects and can overload the immune system.
Fact: Children are exposed to a multitude of foreign antigens (substances) each day with the food they eat or even when they get a common cold. The goal is to immunise children as young as possible to give protection against the diseases in the early, vulnerable months of their lives. It has not been proved that giving young children multiple doses or a combination of vaccines will in any way compromise their health.
The bottom line is that we get immunised to protect ourselves, but we must also make sure we have the recommended vaccines to protect those around us. It’s a selfish attitude to expect others to have the vaccines, thus protecting you and your loved ones, while you avoid the small but inherent risks and discomfort for the benefit of others.
But if you have fears, talk to your doctor to make sure you and your family members are current on all recommended immunisations.
Adapted, with permission, from Vibrant Life.
expert advice
Kimberly Thompson, assistant professor of Risk Analysis and Decision Science at Harvard School of Public Health, is a risk analyst who focuses primarily on kids’ health risks. As a scientist and a parent Thompson believes that the health benefits conveyed by vaccination far outweigh the risks posed by the vaccines themselves.
Q: Why are some parents fearful
of getting immunisations for their children?
A: Some parents fear getting immunisations for their children because they don’t like to see their child cry after being poked by a needle. Or they might see each injection as a risk—a chance that something could go wrong and that their child might be one of the unlikely few who experience serious side effects. Most parents cannot easily see the enormous benefits that vaccines provide: the time not spent paralysed from polio, the deaths avoided from bacterial meningitis, or the hours not spent tending to a child at home or in a hospital with an infectious disease that was once common.
Q: Are parents’ fears warranted?
If so, are there studies to support these fears?
A: Since the process of vaccination began with the technique of variolation [inoculation with smallpox] in colonial times, the risks and fears have also been a part of parenting. Medical studies document side effects that follow vaccination in much the same way that they document the increased risks from the diseases in unvaccinated populations. For example, until a few years ago, when the US switched from the oral polio virus vaccine to the inactivated polio virus vaccine, every year approximately eight to 10 American children would develop cases of vaccine-associated paralytic polio. That’s a very small number compared to the thousands of children who would be expected to get polio if the wild polio virus still existed in the US and children were not vaccinated. With the use of the inactivated polio virus vaccine, the vaccine-associated paralytic polio cases disappeared, and now only milder side effects are of concern. Unfortunately, this is not possible with all vaccines, and some generally small risks will remain along with the large benefits.
Q: What are the possible consequences of failure to immunise?
A: The child remains susceptible to the infectious disease, and this could mean that the child may get, and even die from, an otherwise avoidable disease. While background rates of many diseases remain low with the current success of immunisation programs, some of the diseases could again become epidemics if many parents fail to immunise.
Q: How does the new threat of bioterrorism impact the need
to get immunised?
A: The new threat of bioterrorism should serve to heighten people’s awareness of the potential impacts of infectious disease. Still, it is unlikely to change immunisation schedules, since we don’t currently have approved vaccines for bioterrorism agents readily available.
vaccine-preventable diseases
Check with your doctor to make sure you and your children are current with the following immunisations:
- measles
- mumps
- rubella
- tetanus
- diphtheria
- chickenpox
- pneumococcal disease
- hepatitis A and B
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Articles of interest:
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This is an extract from March 2003
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